over a week ago.
To be honest I'm surprised it hasn't melted altogether.
The rest of the afternoon up to now has been spent watching the Extras Christmas Special from 2007 where at the time I found it rather difficult to laugh at it, although it was easy to follow and identify with.
Like the final episode of The Office, this was also transmitted on BBC 1 but the overall nature and dark content hasn't been tampered with.
It starts off at around Christmas where talking dolls of Andy's character Ray Stokes are failing to sell. To make things worse, the ever smug Greg has ended up in a film alongside Clive Owen and along with the actor is interviewed by Jonathan Ross complete with the infamous facial hair.
If you were to pinpoint the time when I went bonkers then it was when Jonathan Ross exposed his extra lengths on television. Although I barely saw an episode of his chatshow back then as I found it hard enough to stay up after 10pm.
Anyway, despite an unsuccesfull audition for a future picture, Greg's agent offers to represent Andy which results in him in sacking his agent Darren who still gets the title of Andy's sitcom wrong; "When The Wind Blows".
With his fame at an all time high Andy is able to get into places such as the Ivy without booking much to the disaproval of Hale & Pace who make what is probably their first appearance on television since the disatrous "h&p@thebbc" 8 years earlier.
There's a scene in their which I don't really get when Andy spots a bald woman in a red dress and tries to get Maggie to say that Elmer Fudd is the first thing that comes to mind.
If they were to do that joke now they could probably just say that the woman was Jade Goody.
I'm pretty certain that one of the autograph hunters wating outside the Ivy is Karl Pilkington, the overall star of Ricky's XFM radio shows and podcasts.
"Bunny" makes a return appearance again in the scene where Andy makes a visit to Hampstead Heath although also making an appearance is George Michael. The scene results in Andy being caught by a lazy press photographer.
Whilst Andy's career is set to go sky high, Maggie ends up being an extra along with Clive Owen in his new film but after being asked to have shit and other rotten stuff thrown at her, she decides to draw the line on being a supporting artist and ends up trying to find a new job.
Andy despite his continuing reluctance agrees to do a Christmas special of "When The Whistle Blows" set in "Spain" and this is where it reveals that the character is just a complete twat when he refuses to liase with the extras on set and even be seen with Maggie in front of them.
After the shooting takes place, he announces to the audience that he is quitting the show without consulting Ian the commisioning editor. Although Ian makes a brief apperance we don't see head writer Damon Beesley in the episode for some reason or other.
The shock announcement sees work declining for Andy, which sees him resorting to previously refused guest roles in Hotel Babylon and Doctor Who where he plays an alien slug that doesn't look too disimilar to Peter Kay's character in Series 2.
The actual alien itself played by the Northern comedian was partly inspired by former programme consultant Ian Levine who went onto produce several stunning late 80s/early 90s soul records on the Motorcity label such as "Footsteps Are Following Me" by Frances Nero and even worked with Take That on a few of their early hits such as "I Found Heaven".
You can always tell one of his records if it's got that rather superb synth brass on it.
Moving back to the main story and Darren has ended up working in the Carphone Warehouse full time along with "Barry" and Dean Gaffney.
When I first saw the episode transmitted with the rest of my mum's family in Norfolk, Dad burst out laughing when Dean made an appearance although I wouldn't have thought he'd have recognised him.
Then again he did appear in the 2006 series of "Celebrity" although I hardly saw a minute of it.
Things are going bad to worse for Andy as his agent won't respond to his phonecalls using the "snowboarding" excuse and Andy confronts him and Greg at the Ivy. He's told that his career is as good as finished unless he accepts an offer to go on one of the most high profile shows on television.
That being Celebrity Big Brother.
Amongst those who Andy appears with are Lionel Blair, June Sarpong, comedian Toby Foster (one of the actors from Phoenix Nights and now a presenter on BBC Radio Sheffield), Chico and Lisa-Scott Lee.
The latter two themselves ended up on ITV2's disastrous "Celebair" last year.
The other contestants include a woman who appeared in a sex tape and a mother who's son was murdered.
The Big Brother scenes provide for me which is possibly the overall highlight of the show (well it was judging by my condition at the time) when at a random point
the noise of Noel Edmonds's gunge tank goes off signifying that they
have to start dancing with a large ball to the tune of the Birdie Song.
I think that was the right move to make by the editors, as what you'd hear in such instances on the actual Big Brother wouldn't be so good for obvious reasons.
The time spent in the house really gets to Andy and he lets off steam with a rant about all the contestants "handing in their dignity at the door" which ends up being a rather tearful apology for Maggie, his only true friend throughout all the awkwardness.
This results in Andy walking out, and finally getting the respect and attention that he's been looking for all along, but just as he's about to attend a press conference he gets into a car with Maggie and drives to the airport ending things for the time being.
I'd say the door is still open for at least one more episode and Ricky has been hinting about taking Andy to Hollywood which would be interesting to see.
However after re-viewing the episodes I'd say that I can understand them more than when I first saw them.
Although I still think Stephen Merchant's the funniest in there.
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